My new hobby

Today I found a cluster of outlet stores not far from my home in an industrial area of town. I was headed for the Almond Roca factory outlet when I passed a few others that looked interesting. There was one place in particular that attracted my attention and I had to find out what all the hub-bub was about.
The sign outside read Mountain Sun Inc., and the parking lot was jam packed! I spotted a pair of silver-haired ladies heading for their Buick Regal, but the rearranging of the trunk to fit their two overstuffed plastic bags made me impatient. I headed around the corner for a more open area behind a bus that was unloading. The bus was a shuttle from and assisted living facility and had pulled up right to the curb, and employees from Mountain Sun were outside helping older people out of the bus and into the warehouse. This piqued my curiosity and I scurried in as quickly as possible.
In the front of the warehouse were some seasonal things, candles, ornaments, dishtowels and decorative plates, all on display shelving and wooden china cabinets with bright yellow signs that said "All merchandise 30% off every day!" When I headed past the four checkout counters, I saw that each line had 12-15 people, each with an armload of clothes, and ALL seemed to be over 50. Just past the cashiers were racks upon racks of hanging clothes, all with 30% off signs, all squished together so you could barely squeeze between them. I immediately saw why there was an obvious lack of carts--there would have been no room to push them around. As I looked at the clothes, it became very apparent why the elder generation was so prolific. This store specialized in pastel colored sweatshirts with embroidered flowers or birds on the fronts, most with a white peter pan collar sewn in. This was a geriatric mecca!
Everywhere you turned there were pinks and lavenders and baby blues, everything from Persian kitten faces to chickadees to daisies, and all on fleecy sweatshirt cotton poly. It was like nothing I had seen before. I wandered to the back where there were tables of folded t-shirts for $5-7. I spied a rack of every sweatshirt/jacket style imaginable. Collared, crew neck, cardigan, zip front, kangaroo pocket, unfinished edges, smooth ribbing--I was in awe. I also spotted a table with t-shirts from the Tall Ships Tacoma festival held this past summer, (some Glow in the Dark,) and an entire collection of purple shirts with Red Hats embroidered on the front. I found polar fleece gloves, knit hats and patterned bobby socks for 99 cents.
There was so much to take in I wandered aimlessly for some time. Finally I found a pumpkin orange long sleeved t-shirt for my son, but the line was going to take at least 30 minutes to get through. Each line had a dozen people or more in them (mostly ladies, but some women with a man looking bored with his arms clenched around a huge wad of fleece). And with each person, who each had an armload, the checkout process was lengthened by questions of "How much was that again?", and commentaries like "This is for my grand-daughter in Wisconsin--she loves butterflies!" I had to leave because of my time restraints, but I am going back another day. And this time, I'll be watching each person, and listening to each comment, and scribbling down silly things in my notebook. I'll ask the lady in line behind me what she is buying and who it is for, and I'll suggest she pick up some matching socks for that darling "Chocolate lovers" sweatpants set. And when I get to the front of the line, I'll tell her "Oh why don't you go ahead of me; you have a bus to catch." I think this hobby rivals my old one of hanging out in cemeteries!